Sunday, September 20, 2015

Thanks, Johnny Walker

Not the whiskey. Whoever wrote that nice review for Amazon. Reposting the review with gratitude:

It's likely that only Stan Goff could have written this book - and thank
God that he did. Reading through the some 400 pages of Borderline is
akin to sitting with your doctor as she relays diagnosis after diagnosis
of your sick and failing body. The pages are often jarring and
unsettling, disclosing secrets you'd rather remain blind to, yet they
are desperately needed and therapeutic - even if the therapy is painful.
Whenever someone committed to the church and its Lord exposes the ways
the church has failed to be faithful to God's gracious Word, we ought to
humbly receive this chastisement as the merciful discipline of God. To
confess Christ as Lord is to stand under his judgment, which, as Rowan
Williams puts it, is to receive the truth "about us as human beings
implicated in a network of violence and denial" (OCT, 81).

Goff begins,

I
want to tell you some stories, but I will need a little theory, a
little philosophy, a few schemas and paradigms, and a little cultural
criticism to make the stories tell you the stories within the stories.
Narrative theologians say that Christians are a 'story-formed
community,' so if stories are formative, then we have to attend to all
the stories that for us, especially those stories that might be forming
us prior to the story of Christ and that might hold us back from fuller
participation in the story of Christ. (xv)

The stories within the
stories that Goff hopes to unveil are the stories of masculinity, or
manliness, and its relation to war, as well as manliness and its
relation to women. Both of which, of course, are united by a shared
vision of masculinity which creates an intersection between war and
gender (or sex). All of which find themselves colliding together in
Goff's own autobiography, as a long-time war veteran turned
feminist-Christian-pacifist.

The thesis is simple and, even at first glance, persuasive - all the while being disturbing.

War
is implicated in masculinity. Masculinity is implicated in war.
Masculinity is implicated in the contempt for and domination of women.
Together, these are implicated in the greatest sins of the church.

Borderline
is about two questions. First, why have Christians been so warlike?
Second, why do Christian men still caricature, dominate, misrepresent,
condescend to, and dismiss women? I am convinced that these two
questions must be answered together. (1)

So in order to answer this,
Goff tells a couple of big stories, "provid[ing] a rough genealogy of
church-and-war alongside church-and-sex in which the reader can discern
how often, and often terribly, the church has allowed itself to be
pulled away from the example and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth" (3).
The narrative narrows as it moves forward, beginning in early
Christendom, working up to Enlightenment Europe, spending a good length
of time in US history, and ending with Goff's own experience in the
military, beginning in Vietnam and stretching to the end of the 20th
century.

For Christians then, especially Christians in the West,
especially Christian men in the West, especially white Christian men in
the West, this is a kind of "group autobiography" (6). One which plants
us (I'm writing as a white Christian man) within a story that we'd
rather not be a part of us, but which nonetheless we must confront,
because it continues to determine how our lives are lived.

Goff
writes as a pacifist, however, he is clear that "As a Christian, I am
not trying in this book to 'make the case' for pacifism. I don't need an
account of the state, war, or masculinity to underwrite my commitment
to nonviolence, because that commitment is based on my belief that war
has been abolished in the kingdom of God, even as we live now between
Pentecost and Parousia" (5). So this book is not a book for pacifism,
nonetheless, there is obviously much prodding that direction, especially
as Goff demonstrates the way in which war, as a set of practices,
cultivates masculinity-conceived-as-domination, which has been so
detrimental to women. That is definitely not to say that only pacifists
will find this book worthwhile. That history and analysis set forth here
are such that any Christian, especially just-war Christians, must deal
with them.

Stan Goff is a very gifted writer and wonderful story
teller - even if the stories he tells are not so wonderful. The book is
very readable and engaging. He ranges from discussion of the Crusades
to witch-hunts, to a cultural analysis of the movie Man On Fire, to
ramblings in Enlightenment philosophy and psycho-analysis, even touching
on American ideals of respectability and eugenics.

The book
prompts question after question. Some of which go answered, many of
which do not. His skilful wielding of wide range of feminist theory helpfully
gives readers new eyes to discern the hidden ways in which harmful
power arrangements are upheld in apparently neutral cultural myths and
practices. Especially illuminating was Goff's (Augustinian) insights
about the often perverse nature of sex (married or non-married) within a
society of masculinity-as-domination. Any Christian sexual ethic must
deal with the uncomfortable relationship between eros and violence.

All
in all, this a very important and well executed book. One which I am
still trying to come to terms with - and which I expect the church as
whole needs to come to terms with. Discussion about gender today is
confused on all quarters and while Goff does not give us a prescription
for how to go forward, he does offer certain delimitations that should
be commended. Likewise, debates over the Christian engagement in violent
conflict will continue, but Goff has rightly pointed our attention to
the way in which decisions here have dramatic affects upon women and our
understanding of gender.

There is honestly so much that could be
said about this book. Its scope is massive and I don't pretend at all
to have done it just. Many areas demand further reflection and
investigation and I suspect certain points need much greater nuance and
theological/philosophical consideration. Nonetheless, I earnestly
commend this book and I pray it receives a wide hearing.